Development

Development must be achieved for all people, without discrimination.

Disabled people have been denied access to full and equal participation in their societies, putting them amongst the poorest of the poor. They are left behind to suffer the symptoms of a lack of development, malnutrition, poor sanitation, lack of immunisation, poverty, and poor health.

Development programmes can no longer make excuses for not addressing disability.

"Overlooking or ignoring the plight of disabled people is not an option that an acceptable theory of justice can have." Amartya Sen

"Unless disabled people are brought into the development mainstream, it will be impossible to cut poverty in half by 2015 or to give every girl and boy the chance to achieve a primary education by the same date - goals agreed to by more than 180 world leaders at the UN Millennium Summit in September 2000" James Wolfensohn

DAA publishes the following papers on subjects related to Development:

Disability and a Human Rights Approach to Development

“Disability is a human rights issue! I repeat: disability is a human rights issue.”

The Commonwealth Disabled People's Forum press release

How To Be An Ally

Most people in our society do not yet see the connections between different forms of oppression, or even have a general sense of how oppression works. Therefore, we still find ourselves dealing in most instances with one form of oppression at a time, and in a given setting, we are either in the role of oppressed or ally.